As negotiations take place this week in Japan for a free trade agreement covering the Asia-Pacific region, a group of intellectual property scholars is calling for the public interest to be clearly considered in the copyright rules of the future agreement.

As the 17th round of negotiations for the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) is taking place in Kobe, Japan, a statement has been circulated and endorsed by 64 IP scholars from a number of countries.

The RCEP would include the 10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) – Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, and Vietnam – as well as Australia, China, India, Japan, South Korea, and New Zealand.

The “Statement of Public Interest Principles for Copyright Protection” under RCEP says that the RCEP intellectual property chapter “will set out a host of minimum standards for IP protection” in the participating countries. The statement has been circulated by Haochen Sun, associate professor of law and director, Law and Technology Centre, The University of Hong Kong.

The signatories of the statement are “deeply concerned about the copyright protection standards proposed for the RCEP IP Chapter.” According to the statement, those standards may cause unintended effects “of stifling creativity, free speech, and economic growth.”

Public interest should be a core value for copyright negotiations, the statement says, calling for increased transparency of negotiations for the public interest.

In particular, RCEP negotiators should “scrutinize current protection of the public interest in using copyrighted works,” examine public interest mandates under international copyright treaties, and consider public interest mandates under international human rights treaties.

Signatories called for the RCEP to make all negotiating texts and other relevant documents publicly available, and strengthen stakeholder engagement, including public hearing meetings.

They also warned against rules preventing the introduction of limitations and exceptions for “legitimate purposes such as criticism, comment, education, news reporting, parody, research, and facilitating access for persons with disability.”

Also of concern, they said, is the fact that internet service providers are at risk of being held “secondarily liable for copyright infringements committed by users.”

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